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Posted by: A Horse With No Name

Our favorite evil queen is back in a new tsk-tsk against the beloved Mr. Kohs:

http://blog.shankbone.org/2009/04/14/greg-kohs-gets-pwned-at-encyclopedia-dramatica/

Kohs, take it from this horse's mouth -- Mr. Miller ain't good enough to flush your toilet!

Posted by: GlassBeadGame

I get it. It looks like a newspaper because he's a journalist.

Posted by: Jon Awbrey

No, it looks like a newspaper because he's a parakeet.

Ja Ja

Posted by: GlassBeadGame

Makes me sad. I had to get rid of budgey. What with the demise of newspapers and all it just cost too much to line the cage with laptops.

Posted by: Milton Roe

Indeed a poor trade.

Fun fact: the inside of a thick never-opened conventionally printed newspaper makes a pretty good surface upon which to rely for cleanliness in emergencies. Such as where to put an emergently born baby, or what to use impromptu on a severe injury. The reason being that the high heat and pressures of the modern high speed press kill bacteria quite well, and the rest of the wrapping process then protects the surfaces from further outside contamination.*

And that's not all. Besides being relatively free of bacteria and viruses, the inside of a modern newspaper is also nearly sterile of imagination, wit, wisdom, perspective, and scholarship, as well.

Not that most of what you get over the net on your laptop is any better, and is usually worse. All of this has been eroding per Gresham's Law of the Jungle, these last 20 years. The losers being ye books in ye libraries. Which anon becometh harder and harder to find as the process doth proceed.

Let's hope something is found to turn this mess around before the Tragedy of the Commons finally kills it off completely. Not withstanding a lot of fine stuff donated altuistically to the world, the "free information" movement has too often given us only that which we paid for. Such is life.

Milton


* You don't know whether to believe this or not, do you?

Posted by: Kato

David Shankbone:

Good grief.

Shankbone has become a gift for Wikipedia critics. A gift that just keeps giving.

Posted by: LaraLove

Hahaaha. I just don't see how Shankbone can try to push that stupid blog off as anything but a joke. It's so funny in how completely ridiculous it is. The topics, his writing style, his complete lack of integrity. It's awesome. It's like the Fox News of internet shit no one cares about.

Posted by: Somey

Hopefully everyone reading this is already aware that the ED "User:Gregory Kohs" is not, in any way whatsoever, the real Gregory Kohs. More likely, it's Shankers himself.

But just in case not everyone is aware, I just thought I'd mention it!

Posted by: the fieryangel

But! But!! Shankbone's VP of Wikimedia NYC! He's gotta be important!

Posted by: Milton Roe

Stuff sort of happens. Consensus is reached. The passive voice is used.










Penis photos are posted.

Posted by: LessHorrid vanU

I looked but were unable to find any of those particular images that Mr Shankbone is so associated with (gynaecology detailed pictures of male genitalia) on Wikipedia - and here - anywhere on his blog. Why is this?

Posted by: A Horse With No Name

But Shanky can get a job a Fox News...doesn't he already know someone who works there (as per an older blog plop)?

Posted by: wikiwhistle

He got jimbo to delete them, presumably connected to some posts on his blog about wanting to advance his career in the real world. Perhaps he doesn't want to seem like a type people wouldn't want to employ.

Posted by: dogbiscuit

Which would then beg the question as to why he would do such a nasty pointless piece on Greg which shouts out personal grudge and failure to grasp the lack of importance of Wikipedia politics in the real world.

I remember the real world, it was much more fun than this one.

Posted by: Somey

At the risk of redundantly repeating this repetitive point for the umpteenth time, this is just more of the same classic hypernarcissistic hoo-ha that we've been getting from Shankers all along.

In other words, getting published has little or nothing to do with talent, creativity, skill, effort, ideas, persistence, or even luck. Instead, getting published is something that happens when you go to a nightclub or a party, and meet someone who knows someone who knows an agent (ad infinitum), and who is naturally super-impressed by some aspect (if not all aspects) of your stellar-perfect personality.

In effect, this is the "extreme version" of the pipe dream Wikipedia sells to all its servants - i.e., the idea that you can "be somebody" by simply sitting in front of a computer, paraphrasing some content found elsewhere, and chatting with people. (Then again, maybe I shouldn't be so critical of them for that, since most other websites don't even require the paraphrased content.)

Posted by: LaraLove

Ha! Ya, that might hinder his chances of getting hired there. I'd forgotten about that, actually. He criticized Fox in that one, right? Haha, oh... how hypocritical.

Some of them have been reuploaded by other users with "don't recall the source", for example, in the source field, verified through OTRS. And they no longer have the stupid "_by_David_Shankbone" in the title.

Posted by: Kato

Shankbone's picture which he titled "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:The_Taint_by_David_Shankbone.jpg" is still there. ***DO NOT OPEN AT WORK*** There was that awful "Gaping Anus" shot as well, but I don't know what happened to that.

Posted by: Somey

Down the memory hole...

Posted by: The Joy

GAAAH! I've been blinded like Tiresias (T-H-L-K-D)!

Posted by: Alison

So now David has resorted to googlebombing his Kohs article up the Google rankings by tagging the blog entry with Greg's place of employment, his position there, etc, etc. How utterly vindictive and how absolutely juvenile. He's like a http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=tweenager indulging in a MySpace tiff.

Seriously, David - I know you're reading this. Please do us all a favour and grow up. You're a big child!!

Posted by: The Joy

Why is this man not banned from all Wikimedia sites? His off-wiki and on-wiki behavior is deplorable and if he were anyone else, he would have been banned a long time ago.

For goodness sakes, Moulton was banned for less! (Sorry to drag you into this, Moulton).

Posted by: Moulton

http://wc3.worldcrossing.com/webx?14@@.1de35bdb/24

When Mr. Paschal Lamb first showed up here on W-R, I wrote this...

Posted by: The Joy

Exile may not solve the problem, but as Shankbone is a prominent Wikipedian who wraps his reputation as a photographer and journalist around WikiNews and Wikipedia, you would think that the English Wikipedia community, WikiNews, and the Foundation would denounce him and distance themselves away from Shankbone.

I'm just shocked that there is so little outrage over his libelous statements against Greg and The Fiery Angel. It's maddening and heartbreaking that he continues to do this and hurt people. Even worse, no one except us is standing up and admonishing him.

I'm not naive. I know people like Shankbone are out there. The lack of admonishment of his actions depresses and angers me more.

Posted by: Somey

For me, sometimes it helps to remember that deep down, in their heart of hearts, as they walk the long, winding road of life, watching the sun rise and set day by day, hearing the laughter of children, and feeling the sand beneath their feet on some faraway beach, each and every one of the people who contribute to Wikipedia is full of pure, malicious evil.

I'm not sure why, but I just feel better knowing that.

Posted by: gomi

Or sociopathic narcissism. Not that there is much difference.

Posted by: Cla68

Who do we notifiy at the Foundation to tell them that they need to remove Shankbone's blog from their blog distro list?

Posted by: EricBarbour

You're joking, right? People have already tried--over and over.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/IncidentArchive463#Shankbone.27s_post_to_Jeffpw.27s_page last August. No action. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/IncidentArchive491#Offsite_Attack No action.

And speaking of Shank http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/IncidentArchive465#Follow_up_re:Folantin_and_David_Shankbone.....

Perhaps CharlotteWebb and Acalamari could please explain http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/IncidentArchive371#Does_Wikipedia_want_David_Shankbone_or_should_we_just_tell_him_to_leave.3F.

Why do people tolerate him? Are the photos and the Wikinews stuff worth all this abuse?

Posted by: Alison

I've already discussed the matter over email with Jimmy tonight. Let's see if anything happens.

Posted by: Alison

I just http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/Incidents&diff=231771355&oldid=231771296. TFA is 'transgendered', according to David. Who knew?

I guess it's not much different from http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Alisa_Valdes-Rodriguez&action=history on Alisa Valdes-Rodrigues sexuality

Posted by: the fieryangel

I guess I'd better start shaving then...It's a good thing that Oversight took care of all of my personal information on the EN-WP site, isn't it?

Posted by: wikiwhistle

I thought they did? Or was that just for Wikipedia? Jimbo said he wanted it removed.

Posted by: Moulton

The problem is that Shankbone has no empathy for his victims and no remorse. Or, as Gomi puts it, he exhibits traits of narcissistic sociopathy.

For such individuals, admonishment and other traditional forms of shaming and/or guilt tripping are ineffective at best and counterproductive at worst. Such unbecoming tactics tend to displace any fragile feelings of remorse — the crucial emotional state upon which a constructive change of behavior might otherwise have emerged, going forward.

Posted by: A Horse With No Name

"Prominent"? "Reputation as a photographer and journalist"? Who are we talking about? He's just, by his own admission, a failed would-be lawyer with serious emotional issues who sticks free photos online and gets invited on junkets because he gives away interviews to Wikinews.

Has Mr. Miller (I am not using his idiotic pseudonym anymore) ever been paid for his work? Any shmuck can click snapshots and put them online -- that doesn't make you a professional photographer. And which professional media sources paid for his articles? Outside of Wikinews and his increasingly deranged blog, I am unaware of his work being published anywhere.

Posted by: One

Free photos do get picked up by newspapers.
http://www.patriotledger.com/archive/x1237126228/MUSIC-PREVIEW-Bang-Camaro-is-not-your-typical-rock-band
http://coloradoindependent.com/21271/focus-on-the-family-vastly-outpaced-mormon-spending-on-proposition-8
http://gawker.com/5067374/new-york-gossip-bitches-about-jimmy-wales

Posted by: Somey

Tell us something we don't already know...?


Do you have any constructive suggestions? I don't believe anyone here seriously believes there's a way to get Shankers to change his behavior, unless it's for the worse. The issue we're dealing with here is that Wikipedia encourages him, quite openly and directly, by including him on their stupid-ass "Planet Wikimedia" group blog site, among other things. (Yeah, some "planet"! Almost makes you wish Global Warming would get going a little faster.)

I will at least say that 3,000 uploaded photos is an impressive number of uploaded photos. Not technically difficult with today's technology, but still... awfully time-consuming, and even in New York City it must have been hard to find some of those things. The question is, can he legally demand that all of those photos be deleted if he gets blocked, or banned... or even dropped from their group blog? Because you know he'll try, there's no question of that. I have to believe that's what's holding them back - it certainly can't be his behavior, that's for sure.

Posted by: Jon Awbrey

So long as we're all asking questions that ought to be purely retro-ical by now —

Why do you think they encourage him?

Jon

Posted by: Moulton

Tell me what puzzles or perplexes you, and we can define a research project around it.


Yes.

But Cognitive Behavioral Therapy requires protracted dialogue, which is not supported here.


There is a way for him to change his behavior, but not a way for anyone here to coerce or manipulate such a change by means of rebuke.

Posted by: CharlotteWebb

Heh. People criticize me for a lot of things, but of these "focusing too much on people's good sides" is among the rarest.

I've never had the pleasure (or displeasure) of directly interacting with David, I've only noticed photos on a conspicuously great many of the biographical articles I've read and edited. I sure don't read his blog, and I'm not going to complain if somebody declares it a BADSITE if that's what it mostly is.

I'm also not going to complain if some of his uploads are deleted if plainly established to have no encyclopedic use. I've heard a few of them are, well, gross but I do know most of the ones I've seen are an unambiguous asset to the project (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:David_Shankbone/Entertainershttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:David_Shankbone/AuthorsWritersPoetshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:David_Shankbone/AuthorsWritersPoets, etc.) without which we'd be stuck (in most cases) with no image, "fair use" images, or images dubiously uploaded as "free" by a single-purpose account. Sure, find the bad ones (such as http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/fb/Man_protests_Proposition_8_with_Sarah_Palin_placard.jpg/500px-Man_protests_Proposition_8_with_Sarah_Palin_placard.jpg) and nominate them for deletion but try not personalize the issue, resort to name-calling, etc.

Content over conduct, matter over mind, deeds over words, however you want to look at it. You have to weigh the pros and cons of everything, and I stand by my previous statement that banning him (or intentionally pissing him off) would do the project more harm than good.

As a wholly practical matter consider that prolific photographers are the last people we'd want to have issuing take-down notices in the event of a license change. At least for article text one can re-write completely from scratch and reach a similar level of quality, much more easily than one can obtain a free picture of a specific person.

Sure people take pictures of people all the time but I doubt I've ever set foot close enough to photograph anyone who has an article on WP (always up in the cheap seats I guess). I know anyone can do it but most people don't, plus there's a lot to be said about having connections (and a camera handy at all times—and a willingness to do it for free, release it as "free", but allow other people to make money off it). Most people fail in at least one of these areas.

Posted by: Lar

Licenses are not revokable, once granted, for a particular version of an image.

He can demand whatever he wants, the important question is whether Commons is bound to delete them. The Commons community has a long standing practice of deleting images at the request of the uploader if they are not in use, but that's a courtesy granted to editors in good standing.

A considerable fraction of the images that David has contributed are the best image that the project has of the subject. In some cases by a wide margin. On the other hand, some are not, and are replaceable. Further, some of the images strike me as not particularly useful at all.

If an image is among the best we have of a topic, and is in use, I'd be arguing against its deletion.

Posted by: Noroton

In January, at Miller's request, his blog http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Planet_Wikimedia the Meta blog aggregator http://en.planet.wikimedia.org/ (scroll down to "Requests for Removal")

Wikipedia has its own aggregator, http://open.wikiblogplanet.com/ (why pick a name that can be so easily confused with "Planet Wikimedia"??). Apparently User:Nickj operates it from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Nickj/open-wikiblogplanet-config.ini The discussion page has a removal request from Kelly's Nonbovine Ruminations blog. Miller's blog is still listed (see link "87")

Posted by: CharlotteWebb

Well yes unless I'm missing something it does seem outrageous that one would consider Kelly's blog more offensive than David's. I shouldn't be surprised though.

Posted by: MrM

The licenses themselves say that they're not revocable, but to quote Eugene Volokh: "Nonexclusive licenses given for free are generally revocable, even if they purport to be irrevocable."

Posted by: CharlotteWebb

Like the err... editnotice... says, "Please source your claims and provide links where appropriate".

Context: http://lwn.net/2000/0330/


To know whether the example he cited should mean anything to us we'd have to understand the incident in question, which doesn't seem to be mentioned on Wikipedia at all (!) but here's one summary of it:

http://www.tbtf.com/resource/cphack-history.html

Posted by: Noroton

"Outrageousness" is an interesting concept here. Wikipedia tolerates an editor's stated belief in anything, and probably just about any non-Wikipedia-related actions by any editor. I think Idi Amin, if he were still alive, could be an editor in good standing, editing articles between bites of human flesh, as long as he wasn't eating another Wikipedian.

Bedford, on the other hand, was desysopped (but not banned as an editor) by Jimbo, partly because of some statements made online but off Wiki, if I remember correctly. It had something to do with derogatory statements about women, but my memory is vague about it. And it dealt with specific Wikipedia editors, or could be interpreted that way, but again, my memory is vague.

These seem to be some of the de facto rules for being sanctioned in some way for outrageousness (other than obvious bad behavior on wiki):

1. You can put up any photo you want on your own user page, no matter how pornographic (see the current AN page for a discussion of that. Privatemusings started it). Unless, of course, it depicts children.

2. You can do anything you want to a non-Wikipedian off wiki.

3. Offend fellow Wikipedians with sexist comments and you're nearing the boundary. Make a sexist comment *about* a fellow Wikipedian and you've crossed the line, on wiki or off. Probably anti-gay or racist comments would also get you over the line into sanctionable territory, but only if directly connected with a fellow Wikipedian.

If I had to bet, I'd bet against the Shankbone blog being yanked from the Wikipedia blog aggregator, although the standards there probably should be even higher than what Wikipedia would tolerate in an admin before removing the tools. Mr. Miller has probably made the same calculation and is keeping just on the safe side of the line -- just where the maximum level of drama and tolerable outrageousness would be.

Posted by: CharlotteWebb

Ah hah, so this must be why everyone assumed Bedford was trolling when he implied Shankbone's photo was creating BLP problems on the Sarah Palin article! No, it's because he's a right-wing nutter, or no, it's because he's homophobic and this was just part of some blog war between him and Shankers!

There ain't no good guy, there ain't no bad guy. Dave Mason said so.


Well, you might be giving him a little too much credit for thought put into his statements.

Posted by: Noroton

Bah! Nothing wrong with being a right-wing nutter!

Maybe. It's probably more like a feeling of entering dangerous territory than much of a thought, but I'm happier being ignorant about it, which, as usual, means I probably should've shut up a while ago.

Posted by: wikiwhistle

http://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Planet_Wikimedia&curid=74422&diff=1319693&oldid=1300141 , which I presme is why shanks wanted it removed in january, as an "I dumped you, you didn't dump me" ego-saving type thing.

Looks like someone forgot to remove him after Jimbo's request, if he hasn't been removed.

Posted by: Somey

Ehh, I seem to have gotten confused as to which "blog aggregator" he's on, and it could be argued that the one he's on now isn't as "official" as the first one, which means he's not being encouraged to the same extent he was a few months ago.

But as Moulton suggested, given the nature of NPD, his removal from the preferred blog aggregator probably just made him nastier, given that he can now self-justify by saying "they dropped me from their blog aggregator, so I'm going to get my revenge," blah blah blah.

The fact remains that there will always be a handful of Wikipedia Uber Alles types for whom someone like Shankers can do no wrong, simply because they see him as some sort of rottweiler-ish attack dog. And when a person is that far gone, narcissism-wise, that's all it takes - unless he receives (for all practical purposes) unanimous repudiation, he'll always be able to say, "but so-and-so knows me and thinks I'm a great guy, so what's your problem?" ...and just keep on doing what he does.

All I can do, speaking only for myself, is continue to point out that as long as Shankers remains unbanned and/or tolerated on Wikipedia, nobody from Wikipedia should be deemed to have any legitimate right to complain about how we operate or what we post here on WR, or even to complain about Encyclopedia Dramatica. To suggest otherwise is utterly laughable. We will always have and maintain the "moral high ground" over Wikipedia, as long as this situation continues.

Posted by: Moulton

As long as it's seen as a contest between competing tribes, the contest is likely to continue whilst the pep squads cheer on their respective teams.


The problem with moral relativism is that the contestants tend to think they are winning if they doing at least incrementally better than the other guy. What moral relativism overlooks is that the whole arena can be ineluctably sinking into the dark and deplorable depths of damnable depravity.

Posted by: Jon Awbrey

Hobgoblind o' th' Duelist Mind, Batman! Why is everyone always so oblivious to the Turdium Quid who always wins, the one who rents out the stadium?

I guess my guess would have to be that Skunkboner gets e-couraged to whatever extent he does because he's a representative sampleton of the target market that Jimbo guesses he'll get the greatest return pandering to. In this case, it's a brand of mutual pandering — Panders Of A Feather Pimp Together.

Jon

Posted by: Somey

That's it exactly, isn't it?

In the days before The Social Web Revolution™, there was a reasonably clear distinction between recognition and notoriety. The distinction is still there, but it's obscured by the web's immediacy and cheap accessibility. So, the classic hypernarcissist personality can't see the distinction, or doesn't want to.

And to make matters worse, everything on the "social web" is so hopelessly based on instant gratification that a hypernarcissist who's in his mid-20's - who grew up with this state of affairs and perhaps can't actually remember a time when things were any different - is simply lost in it. It might not even have occurred to him that some people wouldn't respect and admire him merely for his ability to get attention by behaving in ways that demonstrate moral bankruptcy and sociopathic tendencies.

Ultimately, that's the genius of Wikipedia: It panders to precisely that sort of person, and the pandering is built right into the software. It's literally the very core of the system.

Posted by: Jon Awbrey

Good, that's settled, this Turkey's done — let's accord him now his richly deserved oblivion and move on to mo bettah subjects.

Jon

Posted by: Alison

Well, it's 404'd now, so I guess David saw sense and took it down. I've no idea as to what he was trying to achieve with that blog entry in the first place, other than trying to garner attention

Posted by: The Adversary

I don´t really want to start a new thread, "Shankbone vs. Alison", so I post it here:
Shankers have been http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Alison&diff=prev&oldid=284815737, claiming his innocence in posting pictures of Palestinian kids with toy guns; he claims he only put that picture on the "Toy gun" article.
Not true.
On Christmas eve (no less) he put the picture of the boy with the toy gun into the "Nazareth" article http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Nazareth&diff=179983023&oldid=179920860.
An editor who, if we are to believe her user-page, actually lives in Nazareth, angrily removes the picture, with the edit line http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Nazareth&diff=180788420&oldid=180786888

Shankbone has also been low-level edit-warring over at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Children_and_minors_in_the_Israeli–Palestinian_conflict, trying to insert the same picture http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Children_and_minors_in_the_Israeli–Palestinian_conflict&diff=179982234&oldid=176761040 http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Children_and_minors_in_the_Israeli–Palestinian_conflict&diff=prev&oldid=211850615 (With help from http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Children_and_minors_in_the_Israeli–Palestinian_conflict&diff=201059617&oldid=199559324.)

And why I have spend 5 minutes of my life on this, I really don´t know

Yeah; let´s move on.

Posted by: Alison

Yeah, I've been ignoring the guy and his nonsense. No sense in feeding him & besides, I've much better things to do in RL

What he doesn't realize re. Alisa Valdes-Rodriguez is that I became involved with her article as a result of a distraught message relating to oversight. While I cannot discuss the details of course, and it didn't fall under Oversight remit, but I did my best at the time to limit the damage that David had been doing with her BLP on Wikipedia. He's pretty-much had it in for me since then. Ms. Valdes-Rodriguez was concerned at the time that he was beginning to obsess with her. Needless to say, Mr. Shankbone is totally unaware of the oversight background to this, nor of the subject's pleas. This was last February or thereabouts. It's all in the edit history.

She said on her blog at the time;

QUOTE

I stupid[ly] set about trying to rid Wikipedia of the sexuality stuff, in hopes of minimizing the very real danger to me and my family at the hands of these obsessed and dangerous detractors. It only made the issue bigger, in particular because a man named David Shankbone, who is a self-proclaimed editor at Wikipedia (and frustrated writer) became obsessed with me too.

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Alisa_Valdes-Rodriguez&diff=272086496&oldid=272019808 that Mr. Shankbone thinks is okay to place, unsourced*, into someone's BLP, and explicitly against their wishes. Folks already know all this. And what's missing from this picture? Kindness, consideration, decency.

BTW - he's back http://blog.shankbone.org/2009/04/20/seth-finkelstein-the-guardian-and-wikipedia/ again. Why???

(* yes, unsourced. The 'sources' cited were utterly unacceptable)

Posted by: Somey

Notice how he misspells the word "gun" in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Palestinian_boy_with_toy_guy_in_Nazareth_by_David_Shankbone.jpg's filename as "guy," so that it would get past the POV-patrollers when he uploaded it. He's clever, I'll give him that much!

Unfortunately, as you say, he's also a self-serving liar. If only he could use his innate cleverness for goodness, instead of badness...


Because the in-game reputational capital he grew by "uploading 3,000 photos" has been spent, and now he needs a new source.

Posted by: Random832

If you'd read the request, you'd have noticed that it was not on the basis of being offensive, but on the basis of http://nonbovine-ruminations.blogspot.com/2008/04/refocus.html - and, indeed, except for a few "Image via Wikimedia Commons", there is no mention of anything "wiki" at all in seven pages of archives.



To be fair, libeling a publication by claiming that something said on the record in an interview was a fabrication doesn't show a lot of kindness, consideration, or decency, either.

Posted by: Noroton

His lack of empathy just continues to surprise me. It shouldn't, but it does.

Posted by: Alison

That's true, but there's the matter of two wrongs an' all that ...

(and the 'fabrication' was her own, according to herself)

Posted by: The Wales Hunter

If Shankbone isn't careful, he'll go and piss off a genuine spin-smearer and then he'll realise how amateur his attempts really are.

Posted by: Moulton

Mutual Perplexity

When two antagonists exhibit either a lack of mutual empathy, or a degree of perplexity over the other guy's lack of empathy, it is plausible to suspect that both parties are in a state of perplexity.

And if both parties acknowledge that they are in reciprocal and complementary states of perplexity, then they can have empathy for the other's comparable state.

Posted by: Hipocrite

Why is afterellen.com an unreliable source, Allison? Is Viacom not subjecting its online content to editorial review?

Posted by: Cedric

Hmmmm. It looks as though http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Seth_Finkelstein and his "on wiki" contributions got http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/It%27s_a_Good_Life_(The_Twilight_Zone). How very convenient for Slim Shanky.

Posted by: The Wales Hunter

From Seth's talkpage:

Shanky has no idea about the UK media. The Guardian caring about COI when God-knows how many of their staff are card-carrying members of the Labour Party? Ha ha ha!

Posted by: Cedric

And now its back. Sanitized for our protection?

Posted by: dtobias

People will expect a picture of Mr. Chapman, then... or at least a toy version.

Posted by: Somey

Probably not - this is Viacom we're talking about - but I think you're missing the point. In http://www.afterellen.com/people/2008/9/alisavaldesrodriguez, "AVR" sez:

Why would you assume that a person who claims to be a bisexual and then claims to be "living a straight life" in the exact same sentence is a reliable source about her own sexual orientation? Only an adamantly pro-LGBT person would make that assumption. She sure sounds pretty damn inconsistent, and therefore unreliable, to me, but in any event Shankers never mentions the "living a straight life" part at all in his attempts to change the article, does he? Ehh, nope.

At the same time, this inconsistency was http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Alisa_Valdes-Rodriguez&diff=272086496&oldid=272019808 and that she was "embroiled in a bitter controversy," which is basically "original research" at its worst. For all we know, she might be maintaining or even promoting the inconsistency just for the hell of it - doesn't that sound like it might be loads of fun to you?

Posted by: Cla68

Mr. Shankbone is now on the ArbCom's http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk%3ADavid_Shankbone&diff=285365948&oldid=285282005. In the past, that wouldn't have meant anything. With this new ArbCom, however, it does. Since Shankbone is unable or unwilling to change his attitude, I predict that he will eventually be banned from the English Wikipedia.

Posted by: Moulton

If, as has been suggested, David "Shankbone" Miller is an incorrigible remorseless sociopath and a bully lacking empathy for his objectified victims, then his case could become a template for addressing the rest of the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cluster_B#Cluster_B_.28dramatic.2C_emotional.2C_or_erratic_disorders.29 crowd that has long dominated WikiCulture.

Posted by: Cla68

David, I think you should carefully consider what FayssalF just http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk%3ADavid_Shankbone&diff=285562258&oldid=285527084

Posted by: wikiwhistle

I think she's the most reliable source possible about her own sexual orientation. Perhaps short of getting out the probes and Shanky-style pics As a bisexual it can't always be counted on that you will have partners of both sexes at all times, and anyway you might not feel like it that year/decade or whatever. If a straight person isn't in a relationship, does their orientation become 'asexual'? No, because they still have the same thoughts etc.

Not saying I agree with Shanker's actions though- this highlights the whole problem of the wiki or of the media in general, the cost of 'fame' perhaps.

Posted by: wikiwhistle

He seems to think all the media should go by the NPOV policy of wikipedia. Do you see Ben Goldacre spending half the time refuting homeopathy for instance, and the other half defending it?

Oh I just thought- Seth was open about his interactions with wiki from quite early on. He wrote a whole article called http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2006/sep/28/wikipedia.web20 a whole two and a half years ago. So he doesn't have any relationship with wiki that he hasn't made known.

It's a wiki-sense of the word 'objective'- 'objective' is used as a synonym of wiki-neutral, and it's said that Seth cannot be 'objective' about wikipedia, whereas to other people objective means real, and describing his experience is objective; describing what exists and happens on wiki.

Posted by: Moulton

Objective reporting is one of the holy grails of journalism. The concept of objective reporting is widely appreciated among mass media professionals (even if it is unevenly practiced).

The problem with NPOV is that it sets up a tug-of-war among factions with biased points of view. A tug-of-war is in a neutral state if all competing forces are in net balance. If one side increases their tug, the other side has to increase proportionately to counterbalance it. But a high-tension shouting match is not the same as objective reporting on the contest.

An objective report would describe the tug-of-war without amplifying it.

WikiCulture tends to amplify the contest rather than characterize it in an objective manner.

Posted by: thekohser

What's gotten into Moulton with these concise, highly insightful posts?

Posted by: EricBarbour

As soon as HE starts following the NPOV policy ON-WIKI, then I'll take him seriously.

Posted by: Jon Awbrey

One day, maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, and probably not soon, Moulton will discover the triode — and then we'll really get cranking.

And I mean that in the good sense of the word …

Ja Ja